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The Rules of Pacers Digest

Hello everyone,

Whether your are a long standing forum member or whether you have just registered today, it's a good idea to read and review the rules below so that you have a very good idea of what to expect when you come to Pacers Digest.

A quick note to new members: Your posts will not immediately show up when you make them. An administrator has to approve at least your first post before the forum software will later upgrade your account to the status of a fully-registered member. This usually happens within a couple of hours or so after your post(s) is/are approved, so you may need to be a little patient at first.

Why do we do this? So that it's more difficult for spammers (be they human or robot) to post, and so users who are banned cannot immediately re-register and start dousing people with verbal flames.

Below are the rules of Pacers Digest. After you have read them, you will have a very good sense of where we are coming from, what we expect, what we don't want to see, and how we react to things.

Rule #1

Pacers Digest is intended to be a place to discuss basketball without having to deal with the kinds of behaviors or attitudes that distract people from sticking with the discussion of the topics at hand. These unwanted distractions can come in many forms, and admittedly it can sometimes be tricky to pin down each and every kind that can rear its ugly head, but we feel that the following examples and explanations cover at least a good portion of that ground and should at least give people a pretty good idea of the kinds of things we actively discourage:

"Anyone who __________ is a liar / a fool / an idiot / a blind homer / has their head buried in the sand / a blind hater / doesn't know basketball / doesn't watch the games"

"People with intelligence will agree with me when I say that __________"

"Only stupid people think / believe / do ___________"

"I can't wait to hear something from PosterX when he/she sees that **insert a given incident or current event that will have probably upset or disappointed PosterX here**"

"He/she is just delusional"

"This thread is stupid / worthless / embarrassing"

"I'm going to take a moment to point and / laugh at PosterX / GroupOfPeopleY who thought / believed *insert though/belief here*"

"Remember when PosterX said OldCommentY that no longer looks good? "

In general, if a comment goes from purely on topic to something 'ad hominem' (personal jabs, personal shots, attacks, flames, however you want to call it, towards a person, or a group of people, or a given city/state/country of people), those are most likely going to be found intolerable.

We also dissuade passive aggressive behavior. This can be various things, but common examples include statements that are basically meant to imply someone is either stupid or otherwise incapable of holding a rational conversation. This can include (but is not limited to) laughing at someone's conclusions rather than offering an honest rebuttal, asking people what game they were watching, or another common problem is Poster X will say "that player isn't that bad" and then Poster Y will say something akin to "LOL you think that player is good". We're not going to tolerate those kinds of comments out of respect for the community at large and for the sake of trying to just have an honest conversation.

Now, does the above cover absolutely every single kind of distraction that is unwanted? Probably not, but you should by now have a good idea of the general types of things we will be discouraging. The above examples are meant to give you a good feel for / idea of what we're looking for. If something new or different than the above happens to come along and results in the same problem (that being, any other attitude or behavior that ultimately distracts from actually just discussing the topic at hand, or that is otherwise disrespectful to other posters), we can and we will take action to curb this as well, so please don't take this to mean that if you managed to technically avoid saying something exactly like one of the above examples that you are then somehow off the hook.

That all having been said, our goal is to do so in a generally kind and respectful way, and that doesn't mean the moment we see something we don't like that somebody is going to be suspended or banned, either. It just means that at the very least we will probably say something about it, quite possibly snipping out the distracting parts of the post in question while leaving alone the parts that are actually just discussing the topics, and in the event of a repeating or excessive problem, then we will start issuing infractions to try to further discourage further repeat problems, and if it just never seems to improve, then finally suspensions or bans will come into play. We would prefer it never went that far, and most of the time for most of our posters, it won't ever have to.

A slip up every once and a while is pretty normal, but, again, when it becomes repetitive or excessive, something will be done. Something occasional is probably going to be let go (within reason), but when it starts to become habitual or otherwise a pattern, odds are very good that we will step in.

There's always a small minority that like to push people's buttons and/or test their own boundaries with regards to the administrators, and in the case of someone acting like that, please be aware that this is not a court of law, but a private website run by people who are simply trying to do the right thing as they see it. If we feel that you are a special case that needs to be dealt with in an exceptional way because your behavior isn't explicitly mirroring one of our above examples of what we generally discourage, we can and we will take atypical action to prevent this from continuing if you are not cooperative with us.

Also please be aware that you will not be given a pass simply by claiming that you were 'only joking,' because quite honestly, when someone really is just joking, for one thing most people tend to pick up on the joke, including the person or group that is the target of the joke, and for another thing, in the event where an honest joke gets taken seriously and it upsets or angers someone, the person who is truly 'only joking' will quite commonly go out of his / her way to apologize and will try to mend fences. People who are dishonest about their statements being 'jokes' do not do so, and in turn that becomes a clear sign of what is really going on. It's nothing new.

In any case, quite frankly, the overall quality and health of the entire forum's community is more important than any one troublesome user will ever be, regardless of exactly how a problem is exhibiting itself, and if it comes down to us having to make a choice between you versus the greater health and happiness of the entire community, the community of this forum will win every time.

Lastly, there are also some posters, who are generally great contributors and do not otherwise cause any problems, who sometimes feel it's their place to provoke or to otherwise 'mess with' that small minority of people described in the last paragraph, and while we possibly might understand why you might feel you WANT to do something like that, the truth is we can't actually tolerate that kind of behavior from you any more than we can tolerate the behavior from them. So if we feel that you are trying to provoke those other posters into doing or saying something that will get themselves into trouble, then we will start to view you as a problem as well, because of the same reason as before: The overall health of the forum comes first, and trying to stir the pot with someone like that doesn't help, it just makes it worse. Some will simply disagree with this philosophy, but if so, then so be it because ultimately we have to do what we think is best so long as it's up to us.

If you see a problem that we haven't addressed, the best and most appropriate course for a forum member to take here is to look over to the left of the post in question. See underneath that poster's name, avatar, and other info, down where there's a little triangle with an exclamation point (!) in it? Click that. That allows you to report the post to the admins so we can definitely notice it and give it a look to see what we feel we should do about it. Beyond that, obviously it's human nature sometimes to want to speak up to the poster in question who has bothered you, but we would ask that you try to refrain from doing so because quite often what happens is two or more posters all start going back and forth about the original offending post, and suddenly the entire thread is off topic or otherwise derailed. So while the urge to police it yourself is understandable, it's best to just report it to us and let us handle it. Thank you!

All of the above is going to be subject to a case by case basis, but generally and broadly speaking, this should give everyone a pretty good idea of how things will typically / most often be handled.

Rule #2

If the actions of an administrator inspire you to make a comment, criticism, or express a concern about it, there is a wrong place and a couple of right places to do so.

The wrong place is to do so in the original thread in which the administrator took action. For example, if a post gets an infraction, or a post gets deleted, or a comment within a larger post gets clipped out, in a thread discussing Paul George, the wrong thing to do is to distract from the discussion of Paul George by adding your off topic thoughts on what the administrator did.

The right places to do so are:

A) Start a thread about the specific incident you want to talk about on the Feedback board. This way you are able to express yourself in an area that doesn't throw another thread off topic, and this way others can add their two cents as well if they wish, and additionally if there's something that needs to be said by the administrators, that is where they will respond to it.

B) Send a private message to the administrators, and they can respond to you that way.

If this is done the wrong way, those comments will be deleted, and if it's a repeating problem then it may also receive an infraction as well.

Rule #3

If a poster is bothering you, and an administrator has not or will not deal with that poster to the extent that you would prefer, you have a powerful tool at your disposal, one that has recently been upgraded and is now better than ever: The ability to ignore a user.

When you ignore a user, you will unfortunately still see some hints of their existence (nothing we can do about that), however, it does the following key things:

A) Any post they make will be completely invisible as you scroll through a thread.

B) The new addition to this feature: If someone QUOTES a user you are ignoring, you do not have to read who it was, or what that poster said, unless you go out of your way to click on a link to find out who it is and what they said.

To utilize this feature, from any page on Pacers Digest, scroll to the top of the page, look to the top right where it says 'Settings' and click that. From the settings page, look to the left side of the page where it says 'My Settings', and look down from there until you see 'Edit Ignore List' and click that. From here, it will say 'Add a Member to Your List...' Beneath that, click in the text box to the right of 'User Name', type in or copy & paste the username of the poster you are ignoring, and once their name is in the box, look over to the far right and click the 'Okay' button. All done!

Rule #4

Regarding infractions, currently they carry a value of one point each, and that point will expire in 31 days. If at any point a poster is carrying three points at the same time, that poster will be suspended until the oldest of the three points expires.

Rule #5

When you share or paste content or articles from another website, you must include the URL/link back to where you found it, who wrote it, and what website it's from. Said content will be removed if this doesn't happen.

An example:

If I copy and paste an article from the Indianapolis Star website, I would post something like this:

We cannot tolerate illegal videos on Pacers Digest. This means do not share any links to them, do not mention any websites that host them or link to them, do not describe how to find them in any way, and do not ask about them. Posts doing anything of the sort will be removed, the offenders will be contacted privately, and if the problem becomes habitual, you will be suspended, and if it still persists, you will probably be banned.

The legal means of watching or listening to NBA games are NBA League Pass Broadband (for US, or for International; both cost money) and NBA Audio League Pass (which is free). Look for them on NBA.com.

Rule #7

Provocative statements in a signature, or as an avatar, or as the 'tagline' beneath a poster's username (where it says 'Member' or 'Administrator' by default, if it is not altered) are an unwanted distraction that will more than likely be removed on sight. There can be shades of gray to this, but in general this could be something political or religious that is likely going to provoke or upset people, or otherwise something that is mean-spirited at the expense of a poster, a group of people, or a population.

It may or may not go without saying, but this goes for threads and posts as well, particularly when it's not made on the off-topic board (Market Square).

We do make exceptions if we feel the content is both innocuous and unlikely to cause social problems on the forum (such as wishing someone a Merry Christmas or a Happy Easter), and we also also make exceptions if such topics come up with regards to a sports figure (such as the Lance Stephenson situation bringing up discussions of domestic abuse and the law, or when Jason Collins came out as gay and how that lead to some discussion about gay rights).

However, once the discussion seems to be more/mostly about the political issues instead of the sports figure or his specific situation, the thread is usually closed.

Rule #8

We prefer self-restraint and/or modesty when making jokes or off topic comments in a sports discussion thread. They can be fun, but sometimes they derail or distract from a topic, and we don't want to see that happen. If we feel it is a problem, we will either delete or move those posts from the thread.

Rule #9

Generally speaking, we try to be a "PG-13" rated board, and we don't want to see sexual content or similarly suggestive content. Vulgarity is a more muddled issue, though again we prefer things to lean more towards "PG-13" than "R". If we feel things have gone too far, we will step in.

Rule #10

We like small signatures, not big signatures. The bigger the signature, the more likely it is an annoying or distracting signature.

Rule #11

Do not advertise anything without talking about it with the administrators first. This includes advertising with your signature, with your avatar, through private messaging, and/or by making a thread or post.

See, I think those "silly debates" are part of what makes college sports great. To me, there's more emotion than what you get in pro sports, JMO.

I agree though, it is unfortunate, and well stupid that both sides couldn't get it done.

I like the emotion when people are debating basketball and the teams themselves. But a polarizing debate over where to play a game doesn't do anyone any good, IMHO. All it turns into is both sides believing that the other guy is pure evil who is out to screw them. IMHO, IU and IU fans got so caught up in not wanting to be perceived as having lost a war to Calipari that they lost track of what was really important, which was the game itself. What's our prize for standing up to Calipari and not giving into him? No game at all. What a hallow victory.

I know that I'm not adding anything new here as this has been debated to death. But I come on here and read IU-UK trash talk, which would have been fun back when we were playing them in three months. But now it's completely meaningless, and that is sad. I remember watching (and going to) IU-UK games for as long as I can remember. But now Kentucky is just another team who isn't on our schedule. They are no longer a rival. The IU-UK game was always a great way to kickoff the Chirstmas season, and now it's gone. And I blame IU just as much as UK, if not more. They had the opportunity to be the bigger man in this, but in the end they acted just as silly and petty as Calipari. Seriously, who turns down two games in a world class stadium that is freaking 50 miles from your campus in a city that has the highest % of IU alums in the country? Plus we already know that the Indy setup worked EXTREMELY WELL for a long long time. If we think we're better than UK then we should be jumping on the chance to beat them in front of a 50 something thousand seat place that is half IU/half UK

Comment

I like the emotion when people are debating basketball and the teams themselves. But a polarizing debate over where to play a game doesn't do anyone any good, IMHO. All it turns into is both sides believing that the other guy is pure evil who is out to screw them. IMHO, IU and IU fans got so caught up in not wanting to be perceived as having lost a war to Calipari that they lost track of what was really important, which was the game itself. What's our prize for standing up to Calipari and not giving into him? No game at all. What a hallow victory.

I know that I'm not adding anything new here as this has been debated to death. But I come on here and read IU-UK trash talk, which would have been fun back when we were playing them in three months. But now it's completely meaningless, and that is sad. I remember watching (and going to) IU-UK games for as long as I can remember. But now Kentucky is just another team who isn't on our schedule. They are no longer a rival. The IU-UK game was always a great way to kickoff the Chirstmas season, and now it's gone. And I blame IU just as much as UK, if not more. They had the opportunity to be the bigger man in this,And I blame IU just as much as UK, if not more. Seriously, who turns down two games in a world class stadium that is freaking 50 miles from your campus in a city that has the highest % of IU alums in the country? Plus we already know that the Indy setup worked EXTREMELY WELL for a long long time. If we think we're better than UK then we should be jumping on the chance to beat them in front of a 50 something thousand seat place that is half IU/half UK

i gotta disagree with this. there are some things that don't quite fly in my book. such as "And I blame IU just as much as UK, if not more." well, uk wanted it their way or no way at all. and because of that uk deserves more blame for being completely inflexible on this. and "but in the end they acted just as silly and petty as Calipari" no, not really. iu even offered a compromise where we would do a couple of neutral site games and a couple of home games (the wishes of both teams get met this way) but uk still said no deal.
THEY were the ones refusing to budge even an inch. this is all about cowardice. there was no way cal was going to jeopardize his home court winning streak by bringing iu into lexington and facing the possibility of getting beat at home.
if cal got his way on everything, uk would never play another tough home game ever again but only on neutral sites so he can keep his streak alive. uk is a basketball school in a football conference. he knows the sec doesn't put out many tough teams besides uk. i looked at their schedule and yep- totally devoid of any tough home games.
at least we got north carolina coming to town.
bottom line is that we were willing to meet them halfway. they were not willing to budge on anything at all.
does iu deserve some blame? perhaps. but uk deserves more.

Comment

i gotta disagree with this. there are some things that don't quite fly in my book. such as "And I blame IU just as much as UK, if not more." well, uk wanted it their way or no way at all. and because of that uk deserves more blame for being completely inflexible on this. and "but in the end they acted just as silly and petty as Calipari" no, not really. iu even offered a compromise where we would do a couple of neutral site games and a couple of home games (the wishes of both teams get met this way) but uk still said no deal.
THEY were the ones refusing to budge even an inch. this is all about cowardice. there was no way cal was going to jeopardize his home court winning streak by bringing iu into lexington and facing the possibility of getting beat at home.
if cal got his way on everything, uk would never play another tough home game ever again but only on neutral sites so he can keep his streak alive. uk is a basketball school in a football conference. he knows the sec doesn't put out many tough teams besides uk. i looked at their schedule and yep- totally devoid of any tough home games.
at least we got north carolina coming to town.
bottom line is that we were willing to meet them halfway. they were not willing to budge on anything at all.
does iu deserve some blame? perhaps. but uk deserves more.

I know that Cal was stubborn and inflexible. Never said he wasn't. Boy we sure stood up to him, didn't we? So what's our prize for that? No game at all. Yay, what a great victory!

IU had the opportunity to be the bigger man in all of this. It's not like Cal was demanding that we play two games in Louisville or something. He was giving us two games in OUR STATE. Indy has the highest percentage of IU alum of any major city in the country and is 50 miles from IU's campus. Any IU student who wanted to go could have found their way up there. We know for a fact that the Indy setup worked very well for a long time. I understand why many people preferred the series being on campus, but it still cannot be denied that the Indy setup worked pretty well too. It's not like we would be playing in Anarctica or something.

I can't believe we refused this because we missed out on ONE home game in a four year span. And it's not like every student who wanted to go could have gone. When I had student season tickets 5 years ago (the Gordon year), UK was one of the games that I didn't get tickets for.

I care more about the game than I do winning some silly war with Calipari. I don't care that Calipari is a coward, ***, etc etc. That means nothing to me. I just want to see the basketball game. IU could have accepted a fairly reasonable offer to continue the series in Indy's world class stadium. We know it worked very well there for a long time. But instead, we refused because we missed out on one home game in a four year span. Silly, IMHO. We are just as guilty as screwing the fans out of the game as UK is.

We clearly wanted this game more than UK did. When you're bargaining with a party who doesn't want something as badly as you, sometimes you have to make concessions. Winning a war with Calipari became more important to IU than playing the actual game. Shame.

Comment

Me and some of my IU friends were discussing Hoosier football the other day and I prompted this question (I may have asked it on here before, I forget) to them: What is the over/under on years before College Gameday comes to Bloomington? I set it at 18 years (2030). My friends all took the over, some of them citing "never" as their answer. What say you guys? Keep in mind that doesn't mean we are title contenders. We start out 5-0 against cupcakes and beat one ranked team in that stretch and have a powerhouse program ranked in the top 10 like Ohio State or Michigan come to town and who knows?

Comment

Nearly everytime I take a look at this thread, no matter how much time has elapsed, someone on here has something to say negative about UK. I know Hoosiers hope UK/Cal gets in more trouble with the NCAA, but I doubt it happens anytime soon.

Well now, I'm sure that if I were to go out and find a random sports message board where the majority of posters are likely to be UK fans, there would be nothing but sunshine and unicorns from them regarding the Hoosiers. Right?

Comment

Well now, I'm sure that if I were to go out and find a random sports message board where the majority of posters are likely to be UK fans, there would be nothing but sunshine and unicorns from them regarding the Hoosiers. Right?

The troll does have a point though: UK is on cruise control and Calipari is clearly a professional at skirting the rules. They won't get in trouble any time soon. So I'm fine letting them have their one and dones and just beating them with three and degree.

Comment

Me and some of my IU friends were discussing Hoosier football the other day and I prompted this question (I may have asked it on here before, I forget) to them: What is the over/under on years before College Gameday comes to Bloomington? I set it at 18 years (2030). My friends all took the over, some of them citing "never" as their answer. What say you guys? Keep in mind that doesn't mean we are title contenders. We start out 5-0 against cupcakes and beat one ranked team in that stretch and have a powerhouse program ranked in the top 10 like Ohio State or Michigan come to town and who knows?

Purdue, who even IU fans, hoosierguy not withstanding, would admit has an exceedingly better football program than IU has hosted College Gameday just one time. The infamous Orton fumble against Wisconsin was the only time it's been to West Lafayette.

If the over-under was at 18, I would certainly take the over.

"I had to take her down like Chris Brown."

-Lance Stephenson

Comment

Purdue, who even IU fans, hoosierguy not withstanding, would admit has an exceedingly better football program than IU has hosted College Gameday just one time. The infamous Orton fumble against Wisconsin was the only time it's been to West Lafayette.

If the over-under was at 18, I would certainly take the over.

I would probably take the over too, but I give it a better chance than most. IU has never had a good football program. If we all of a sudden started to rise and had an up and coming coach, got some buzz around our program, it's not wild to think they would bring Gameday to Bloomington a game or two into the conference season.

Personally, I think Indiana football needs to pull an Oregon. Now, I don't think we can get to that level of success (or anything close to it), but I think we need to get some buzz around our program. Get Adidas to throw together some crazy uniforms for us--maybe incorporate candy stripes into it or something. If Under Armour can incorporate the Maryland state flag into their uniforms, I think Adidas could throw together something neat to create buzz for us.

Comment

Me and some of my IU friends were discussing Hoosier football the other day and I prompted this question (I may have asked it on here before, I forget) to them: What is the over/under on years before College Gameday comes to Bloomington? I set it at 18 years (2030). My friends all took the over, some of them citing "never" as their answer. What say you guys? Keep in mind that doesn't mean we are title contenders. We start out 5-0 against cupcakes and beat one ranked team in that stretch and have a powerhouse program ranked in the top 10 like Ohio State or Michigan come to town and who knows?

I'd take the over, as in never.

Comment

I would probably take the over too, but I give it a better chance than most. IU has never had a good football program. If we all of a sudden started to rise and had an up and coming coach, got some buzz around our program, it's not wild to think they would bring Gameday to Bloomington a game or two into the conference season.

Personally, I think Indiana football needs to pull an Oregon. Now, I don't think we can get to that level of success (or anything close to it), but I think we need to get some buzz around our program. Get Adidas to throw together some crazy uniforms for us--maybe incorporate candy stripes into it or something. If Under Armour can incorporate the Maryland state flag into their uniforms, I think Adidas could throw together something neat to create buzz for us.

We've tried to create buzz. We had catchy slogans with Hep. We spent 55 million dollars upgrading the stadium and also have built top notch weight and training facilities for our athletes. We play on a beautiful campus and are a flagship school in a Midwestern state that has seen a big rise in the quality of its high school football over the past decade. Unfortunately, the best kids in Indiana don't want to play at IU. We've gone through coach after coach (though tragedy unfortunately intervened with one of them). Nothing works.

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When Hep died, the program gave it's final breath of ever being competitive. His death has never been fully recognized for the impact he had. He had a true passion for the program and his players and was also a pretty good coach.
I don't see gameday ever coming here. Basketball should and will get just about every dollar of revenue for the foreseeable future. There is no doubt the next item on the AD's agenda is a new or renovated stadium for BBall, and the second item is probably the same for soccer.

Comment

Purdue, who even IU fans, hoosierguy not withstanding, would admit has an exceedingly better football program than IU has hosted College Gameday just one time. The infamous Orton fumble against Wisconsin was the only time it's been to West Lafayette.

If the over-under was at 18, I would certainly take the over.

Ugh. Don't remind me. That was the year! The stars aligned! Then the fumble and it all fell apart.

Honestly though, I've never been able to understand why IU can't at least put together a respectable football program. I mean, if Purdue can why can't IU? It's not like IU doesn't give the program resources or anything.

Comment

Ugh. Don't remind me. That was the year! The stars aligned! Then the fumble and it all fell apart.

Honestly though, I've never been able to understand why IU can't at least put together a respectable football program. I mean, if Purdue can why can't IU? It's not like IU doesn't give the program resources or anything.

I agree. I don't see anything that is holding IU back from having a program at least on par with the current Purdue. I don't think it could get to where Purdue was in the early portion of the Joe Tiller years but the late Tiller/Danny Hope period should be attainable. They obviously will never be a good football program but there is no reason they should be a perennial doormat.

"I had to take her down like Chris Brown."

-Lance Stephenson

Comment

I just think it's hard to realize how much we just don't care about IU football. Hep made us care for a while, I was a student then and we went to games and had fun and actually saw the light at the end of the tunnel that beckoned for us to actually be good and then he died and everything changed. EVERYTHING. Letting Bill Lynch take over did not help matters. I firmly believe that if Hep had been the coach of the Lynch team that made the Sun Bowl or whatever it was, that team should have won 9 games that year, but because Lynch is maybe the worst football coach I have ever seen, they struggled to get 7 and coughed up 2 or 3 wins along the way.